Check out our library at LibraryThing.com

May 23, 2010

Suspense - Case Study of a Murderer

"Case Study of a Murderer" is one of Suspense's "taken from life" episodes. It is a sad, but good, story about a wife who mistakenly believes that her husband's psychiatric problems can be cured with love instead of medical care. She then discovers how wrong she is. Jeanne Crain stars as the enabling wife.

As the episode opens, Beth Lathrop tells the story of how the trouble with her husband, Hank, began. She thought that she understood the man she married, but after two years, she found out that he had a secret preoccupation. Hank was obsessed with news accounts of local murders.

Then, he lost his job. Hank's fascination with murder then became so consuming that he impulsively went to the police and confessed to crimes he didn't commit.

Mrs. Lathrop was told that she needed to come to terms with the real problem--her husband needed psychiatric care. Otherwise, his preoccupation with killers might lead him to become one. She thought otherwise. Was she right?